I feel like I’ve seen a lot of the world in my relatively short life. I’ve hiked, camped, climbed, and adventured plenty on most of the continents. I’ve gone to some pretty remote places and seen some pretty remarkable stuff, but I’ve rarely been as connected to the earth as much as I’ve been in the past week. Being plucked from my daily life, the mayhem of a modern age, and then dropped into a boat with a handful of other guys on the open ocean, partly in the name of adventure and exploration, but more poignantly perhaps in the name of togetherness, and of shared, limited resources really, really hits home.
And that’s exactly Mike Horn’s goal. With the Pangaea project (a word that takes its name from the single land mass that was Earth before its continents divided) Mike Horn and his sponsor Officine Panerai seek to educate and create an experience that intimately reminds everyone that comes on board–through a highly competitive, selective process–that we are all in this together. Whether he’s hosting his youth education program with kids from every continent, or he’s hosting dignitaries and world leaders on board, Mike shrinks the world into a 105 foot boat, and everyone aboard must share and collaborate around consumption of food, water, energy–and dealing with waste–without a choice.
Mike says of himself, “I’m not a tree hugger. This is about our ability to live on this Earth and follow our own dreams, whatever they might be.” The Pangaea project is clearly more than a boat and an environmental message. In just a handful of days on board, I’ve learned that Pangaea is about creating and sharing a vision–it’s a manifestation of embracing individual creativity and expression while living amidst one another and the world. From simply “living your dreams” to pragmatically having enough space, food, water–and specifically sustainable energy–to make such living possible in the most practical terms, there is clearly work to be done. And while it’s not always easy to motivate, the results are unequivocally worth the effort.
There’s no two ways about it: in the most acute manner, the Pangaea is a magical metaphor for the world. On one hand, it’s a living, breathing reminder that we need to act sustainably around our basic human needs. On the other hand, we must do so not simply for the sake of having a cause, but rather to provide for us a place–and a framework–where we can live out our dreams.
We are often conditioned through our daily lives to dispose of our dreams as unrealistic. My experience on board Pangaea has already transcended my own documentary photography and filmmaking ambitions into a bigger theme of pure inspiration. Whether our dreams are about creating our next image or film–or deciding, like Mike has, to continually circumnavigate the world as a fearless adventurer on foot, boat, or bike–we should all be reminded that our dreams should not be tossed aside. In fact, they should be the primary things for which we live.
Based on modern life expectancy numbers we each have–on average–around 30,000 days to live. I recommend doing your own math and calculating what you’ve got left.
Lovely shot as are all your shots, Mike and team are fortunate to be sponsored by a luxury goods manufacturer wanting to inspire those with disposable income to buy their product by dangling a ‘lifestyle’ dream in front of them.
Call me a cynic but it’s all fundamentally all about marketing and capitalism, ultimately how many watches Panerai sell. You might be seeing the shallowness of the consumerism in our world during your trip but, but, but the fact that the trip is funded by it, somehow makes it incongruous. For me at least!
Rosalind,
I must agree with you. I’m a commercial photographer and I often consider the contradictions between my wishes to be sustainable and for the world to become sustainable and those companies that hire me, the resources they and I use to create imagery for the express purpose of selling more and using more resources. The whole idea is often times unsustainable in it’s goals.
I am envious of Chase and his lifestyle and opportunities to see and experience different places and people and at the same time I see the contradictions in it and myself at the same time. To me it always seems to come back to too many people on this Earth. As a species we are unsustainable. I’d love to hear what Chase thinks about these issues as well as Mike Horn. If everyone did what Mike is doing and used the resources he has used in his life we’d all be extinct I’d guess (same for me and most first world people). It’s a conundrum for sure with this modern society and technology that enables us to do all the stuff we do.
Philosopher, Immanuel Kant wrote on ethics, “Act only according that maxim by which you can at the same time will that it become a universal law”. I use this often in my life as a measure of ethical behavior, my own and others.
To me that means act only in ways that if everyone acted that same way or did those things you’re doing it would make the world a better place. A tall order indeed for any commercial image maker!
Tim McGuire
That’s kinda the point though, right? I mean – how many of us really know how many days we have left? It might be 15,000, or 15….or 1. How do you gauge “mid life” if you don’t know when your life will end? Maybe midlife for me was 23….
we ushualy dont figure things untill we are in touch with nature lately i have been trying to do the same here in Puerto Rico, there is nothing greater than to explore places that take your breath away.
did anyone else notice the fact that that Panerai watch is huge?
Very nice reflexions, I remember a poem that says:
If dreams came true
I’d wish you gladness
and all yor days
be free of sadness
and as the days go by
your whole live through
I’d give the world
if dreams came true.
Van Pallandt 1960, also a sailor